Senate Democrats held a press briefing on Wednesday on President Trump's proposed tariffs.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Good afternoon, everybody, and I want to thank Senators Kaine and Welch and also Brooks for
00:23joining us here today as we fight against Trump's trade war, as you see right here.
00:33This map has how much each state would pay for this absurd, crazy, chaotic trade war.
00:42But the worst thing about it is that it so hurts American families.
00:48It is estimated that the average American family will pay more than $5,000 out of their
00:54pocket to pay for these tariffs, that these tariffs will cost them $5,000 as the prices
01:03of everything goes up, whether it's groceries or cars or wood or you name it.
01:10Cross the board.
01:12Why would Trump do this?
01:15Why would Trump do this?
01:17One reason, he wants to take the money that he gains from tariffs to give tax cuts to
01:23billionaires.
01:24And when told that American families would pay a whole lot more out of their pockets,
01:31you know what he said?
01:32I don't care.
01:34What kind of bubble is this man and his billionaire cohorts in that they don't understand that
01:41when the average American family is told that you're going to have to pay $5,000 more
01:47for the things you buy, that it pains them so, well, can't buy that new car, can't take
01:57that vacation we've been planning for a whole year with the kids, can't go visit grandma,
02:03got to cut back on even the medicines I buy.
02:08What kind of bubble do they live in?
02:11So we have documented in this chart how much each state would pay from Trump's trade war.
02:22And it's devastating.
02:23I just talked to over 50 people in my state of New York.
02:28We're right on the Canadian border.
02:31Buffalo thinks they could go into a real recession if these tariffs came about.
02:37Plattsburgh, 20% of their businesses are Canadian-owned.
02:41What are they going to do?
02:45And there are tens of thousands of job losses in every part of New York State because they
02:51are tariffs.
02:53They are a tax on families.
02:55They don't like taxes.
02:57This is one of the worst taxes they could put in.
02:59And don't just listen to us.
03:02Rand Paul, hardly a Democrat, tariffs are simply a tax.
03:09Senator Mullen, tariffs is a tax.
03:13He didn't have the right grammar, but I'll read him verbatim.
03:16Tariffs is a tax and it will be passed on to consumers.
03:22According to the New York Times, 6.5 million jobs would be impacted by the Canadian tariffs
03:28and people in red states will be especially impacted from farmers to small businesses.
03:33And here's another problem.
03:35It's chaotic.
03:36He says one thing one day and another thing the next day.
03:39He changes which countries, he changes the percentage, he changes which goods.
03:49And what do businesses hate?
03:52Uncertainty.
03:54Whether you're a small business, a medium-sized business, a large business, you want certainty.
03:59There's no certainty.
04:00That's why the stock market has gone down so much.
04:03Consumers, why is their confidence at lower levels than it's been in a very long time?
04:08In part, in good part, because of these tariffs.
04:11They say if I'm going to have to pay more for eggs or for bread or for gas or for a
04:17car, I better not spend now.
04:21So it's creating huge problems in the whole economy.
04:25So soon, the Senate will vote on a resolution from Senator Kaine to undo Trump's tariffs
04:32on Canadian goods.
04:34And we hope that some of our Republican colleagues will join us in that.
04:42They don't like the tariffs either.
04:44They know there are attacks on the American people.
04:47They know that the stock market is in turmoil, risking people's retirements.
04:51They know that consumer confidence is down.
04:54And the odds of a recession, something people hate, it's harder to find a job, keep a job,
05:00maintain your weekly budget.
05:03If a recession occurs, and now our greatest financial prognosticators are saying the chances
05:08of recession because of these tariffs, this tariff tax goes way up.
05:13So we're going to fight these tariffs tooth and nail.
05:16Trump's done a lot of bad things.
05:18This is way up there.
05:21And one final thing.
05:23Look at what happened in Wisconsin yesterday.
05:26The American people understand that Trump is not on their side on tariffs, on tax cuts
05:32for billionaires, on cutting Medicaid, on cutting the others.
05:37The American people are seeing how bad Trump is.
05:40Tariffs is a good part of it.
05:42And they are not supporting people like Elon Musk and those who support Donald Trump.
05:47Tim.
05:49Thank you to Leader Schumer for being a great partner in this effort.
05:53And here we are.
05:54It's an unusual procedure.
05:55There are not many things where even one senator can file a motion that will be guaranteed
06:00a floor vote.
06:01But the crafters of this legislation, the International Emergencies Act, believed that
06:07while a president might need to declare an emergency, that should not go unchallenged
06:11if members of Congress felt like, hold on a second, let's get this right.
06:16No one is denying that there's a fentanyl challenge in the United States, a huge challenge.
06:20We've all seen it in all of our states, in all of our states.
06:24And that is why this is not an action to undo the Mexico tariffs or undo the China tariffs.
06:32You might argue about whether the emergency is one where tariffs is the right answer.
06:36But clearly, the fentanyl trade is being heavily driven through Mexico or precursor chemicals
06:42from China.
06:44But Canadian tariffs are not the answer to the solution because the fentanyl problem
06:49is not primarily a Canadian problem.
06:52There's an article that's out in the Globe and Mail today that digs into the disparities.
06:5621,000 pounds of fentanyl seized from Mexico coming across the border last year.
07:01And there's a claim that there's 43 pounds seized from Canada.
07:05But the article that's just come out from the Globe and Mail suggests it's actually
07:08a good bit less even than 43 pounds.
07:11Is there work that we should and need to do together on fentanyl?
07:15Of course, Chuck led us to pass the halt fentanyl bill in the Senate just two weeks ago.
07:19And there's more we can do.
07:22But this is not about fentanyl.
07:23It's about tariffs.
07:24It's about a national sales tax on American families.
07:27Trump's economic advisor, Peter Navarro, said that the total of these tariffs will be $6
07:33trillion of taxes paid by American consumers, more than $600 billion a year.
07:40I've told the story of this baker that I have in Virginia.
07:43April is her name.
07:44She owns a bakery.
07:45Some of you might know this place.
07:46It's called Mom's Apple Pie.
07:47Now, is this a good thing for a speech in the Senate recording studio?
07:53Mom's Apple Pie Bakery.
07:54April owns it.
07:55Three locations.
07:56Loudoun, Purcellville, Occoquan.
07:59I was with her recently.
08:00She said, Tim, you've got to do something about these Canadian tariffs.
08:02And I said, April, you've got these three little bakeries.
08:05I mean, Canadian tariffs, how do they affect you?
08:07Pie tins.
08:09All aluminum pie tins.
08:10They all come from Canada.
08:12You increase the price of a pie tin by 25 percent.
08:14And it's even worse if you have a can of beer with your apple pie.
08:18There you go.
08:19Or try some whiskey or something.
08:21The pie tin goes up by 25 percent.
08:23And she said, nobody has to buy an apple pie.
08:26It's to celebrate somebody's birthday or a party.
08:28And if the price of a tin goes up by 25 percent, I sell fewer pies.
08:32I may have to lay people off.
08:34She's been through it in round one with Trump's tariffs in the first term.
08:38My largest business in Virginia is the shipyard, Huntington Ingalls Shipyard in Newport News.
08:43Ships and subs critical to our nation's security.
08:4635 percent of the aluminum and steel that are used in U.S. ships and subs comes from
08:51Canada.
08:52The other 65 percent is American-made steel.
08:53We're having a hard time producing ships and subs on time and on budget now.
08:58These tariffs kick in.
08:59It's going to get much worse.
09:00I'm very, very proud that this is a bipartisan bill.
09:02Rand Paul is an original co-sponsor of the bill.
09:05He's going to take the floor at 3 o'clock today for a half hour to talk about this.
09:09But I'm also proud with the number of stakeholders that have signed on.
09:12This morning, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce signed on to support SJRES 37, the AFL-CIO,
09:18the sheet metal workers, the steel workers, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National
09:24Taxpayers Union.
09:26Mike Pence started a think tank after he stopped being vice president.
09:30I think it's called American Freedom Alliance.
09:34They came out yesterday, Vice President Pence's think tank, came out to support SJRES 37.
09:40We have support left, right, and center because people don't want Americans to have to struggle
09:45to pay more for groceries, pay more for building supplies, pay more for apple pie, for God's
09:50sake.
09:51I'm really happy to be joined by Senators Ossobrick and Senator Welch, and I think Senator
09:54Welch might be up next.
09:55He is.
09:56Yeah.
09:57Thank you very much.
09:58You know, nobody supports tariffs economically.
10:04Economists have looked at this, and they don't work, and they do a lot of hurt.
10:08So what we have with the Trump policy here is essentially a faith-based economic plan.
10:15There's no evidence that it works.
10:18There's overwhelming evidence that it fails.
10:21And the American people are going to get a history lesson starting very soon about Smoot-Hawley,
10:28two names that don't immediately come to mind.
10:31But it was just before the recession that the U.S. had the highest tariffs in our history,
10:39and those tariffs were put in place by a president who got it wrong and thought this would help
10:47us.
10:48Well, it helped us usher in the Great Depression.
10:51And since then, presidents on both sides of the aisle have steered clear of these trade
10:57war tariffs until President Trump.
11:00Now, second, we have an affordability crisis in this country.
11:05Working families are struggling to pay their bills.
11:08And just in Vermont, to make it very concrete, we get a lot of our electricity from Canada.
11:14We get a lot of our gasoline in the northern part of Vermont from Canada.
11:20We get our home heating fuel from Canada.
11:24And those bills for folks are going to go up immediately.
11:29Home heating fuel, gasoline, electricity.
11:33Why in the world would we do that?
11:36The other thing is that Canada's our friend.
11:42It's not China.
11:44And along the border, where we have decades and decades of mutual respect, we're starting
11:52to change that into distrust.
11:55And a confident country treats its allies with respect.
12:01And these tariffs are going to do direct and immediate economic harm to everyday Vermont
12:07families and farmers, maple sugar producers.
12:11But it's also going to start eroding the trust that is the benefit of good relations over
12:16time.
12:17Why in the world would President Trump want to be Smoot-Hawley?
12:25That's what he's embracing.
12:27Totally, totally bad, totally wrong, doomed.
12:34And the only question is, how much pain will he inflict on everyday Vermonters before he
12:39comes to his senses and withdraws this tariff policy?
12:44Senator, also Brooks.
12:46I just want to thank Leader Schumer and Senators Kaine and Welch for being here today.
12:51You know, President Trump has dubbed today Liberation Day.
12:56And I continue to think how tone-deaf and how arrogant it is, because I'm asking myself
13:03for whom?
13:04You know, who's liberated?
13:05And I think that...
13:06Elon Musk.
13:07Elon Musk.
13:08Yeah.
13:09I think the reality of it is that middle class and hardworking families like the one I grew
13:12up in, I regard myself in so many ways as having grown up in a blue-collar family.
13:17A father who was a car salesman, a mother who's a receptionist.
13:20And the fact of the matter is, the people who are being liberated are the billionaires.
13:26None of his policies, including these tariffs, anticipate any relief for hardworking and
13:31middle class families.
13:33And so those who will be liberated are not us.
13:35And furthermore, he went on to say very arrogantly, you know, there's going to be a little pain,
13:41minor pain and disruption.
13:43But the people that I represent don't regard increasing cost of groceries, increasing cost
13:48of owning a home, increasing cost of owning an automobile as a minor disruption.
13:53But it is a minor disruption to billionaires who can certainly not only afford the increasing
13:59cost of goods, but who will also enjoy a tax cut on the back end of this.
14:04We know that the taxes that we're looking at, the tax cuts will net, we believe, Elon
14:10Musk, about $50 million in tax cuts over a 10-year period.
14:15So just the cynical nature of these tariffs is really, really very disturbing.
14:22And so I have, my first bill is a Tariff Transparency Act.
14:27That has been filed.
14:28I'm going to go to the floor today and ask for unanimous consent on.
14:32And if it is in fact the case that these tariffs are a minor disruption and this is Liberation
14:38Day, we're simply asking this administration and my colleagues on the other side of the
14:42aisle to prove it, to be transparent with the American people, to tell us the cost of
14:48these tariffs.
14:49And I can tell you, I've met in my state with people from every corner of the state.
14:53Just a couple of weeks ago, had the opportunity to sit down with farmers.
14:57Some were poultry farmers.
14:58I met with business owners and many of them feel betrayed by this administration.
15:04The farmers who said, you know what, now not only the retaliatory tariffs will cost
15:10so much money, some were selling chicken parts to other countries and they've said to me,
15:15you know, this is going to cost us money.
15:17And they did not anticipate that they would see actions that harm them as well.
15:22And so I want them to prove to us, who does it benefit?
15:24That's a question that I think is a fair question, is when he says a little pain, who does he
15:30mean?
15:31Who should sustain the pain?
15:32And I would say it absolutely should not be the middle class and hardworking families
15:38of this country who pay for the tax cuts for his billionaire friends and who suffer beneath
15:43these tariffs.
15:44And so we say, again, if it's a minor disruption and this is Liberation Day, we just simply
15:48want to know who should be liberated.
15:50And I think that the Transparency Act will show us that.
15:53We'll take questions on this subject.
15:56This subject.
15:57Yes.
15:58A quick question.
15:59About three weeks ago, you said that as Trump becomes more unpopular, that Republicans will
16:07wake up and they will start to break from him.
16:10Do you think the fact that Republicans are joining Senator Kaine's resolution on this
16:14shows that Republicans are waking up?
16:16Look, the number one factor in terms of Trump's unpopularity is the American people.
16:22And he is becoming less and less popular, particularly on issues like this, on the economy.
16:27His numbers are underwater rather significantly, depending on which poll you do.
16:32And once the American people say, I don't want to embrace somebody, I don't want to
16:36vote for somebody, I don't want to support somebody who embraces Trump's policies, things
16:40begin to change.
16:42But public sentiment is everything.
16:44And we are letting the public know in every way we can, fighting every day on how bad
16:49the Trump policies are for them.
16:52Yes, in the back.
16:54Sure.
16:55A lot of dairy producers in New York and Vermont, and as you know, dairy producers have faced
17:01import restrictions in Canada.
17:03Is it fair for Trump to use some leverage here to get Canada to reduce its trade barriers
17:08on dairy?
17:09Look, are there certain tariffs that make some sense in a specific area where we're
17:14being treated unfairly?
17:15Yes.
17:16But the kind of meat axe blunderbuss approach that they use across the board on everything
17:23and huge amounts is typical of this administration.
17:26They don't think things through.
17:28You know, I dealt with Trump on tariffs back in 2017 when he was president because I was
17:33a hawk on China and so was he.
17:36And I met his people.
17:37I met this guy Navarro.
17:39The guy had no basis of any facts and he sort of had to leave the administration.
17:43Now he's back running the tariff policy.
17:46They don't, as Angela talked about, they don't look at the facts.
17:50He just gets this idea in his head that it's going to be a good thing and does it.
17:54And then he says he doesn't care if the American people pay more.
17:58It's crazy.
17:59Chuck, can I say something?
18:00Yes, Tim, please.
18:01Just real quick.
18:03What a great question, because the dairy issues have, I've heard Chuck talk about them.
18:06I've heard Tammy Baldwin talk about them.
18:09There's a Trump created mechanism to deal with that problem.
18:12The USMCA negotiated by President Trump, I think it got 89 votes here, heavily bipartisan.
18:18Why are they not using the MCA to deal with it?
18:22Because they want money for a tax cut.
18:25If they used MCA to negotiate the differences, they wouldn't have Peter Navarro saying, we're
18:30going to get $6 trillion that we can use for a tax cut.
18:34That's the way they should deal with this problem.
18:36A Trump-inspired, state-of-the-art trade deal that gives them a mechanism for resolving
18:41disputes.
18:42The fact that they're throwing that aside and going with tariffs tells you that there's
18:45something else going on.
18:46It's not just a cross-the-board way.
18:48Now, probably when we're treated poorly across the board, like with China, a broader approach
18:54might be necessary.
18:55When it comes to Canada, when it comes to Mexico, when it comes to Europe, where we
18:59have such complicated, intercombined relationships, that kind of approach hurts only one group,
19:08the American people, the average American family.
19:11On this subject.
19:12Yes.
19:13Thank you, Leader.
19:14What is your response to the President's argument that these tariffs will lead to reshoring
19:20of manufacturing overseas and allow for a level playing field for U.S. industries?
19:25Yeah.
19:26Well, he gets these ideas in his head.
19:27He has no proof.
19:28And most every study, and these guys know this, has shown that that doesn't happen.
19:34Plain and simple.
19:35That's the problem.
19:36There's no factual basis here.
19:38It's a crazy idea in his head that hurts American families and does very little benefit,
19:45and in an untargeted way that makes no sense.
19:48Yes.
19:49In the back there.
19:50The House introduced a resolution to challenge the emergency declaration on Mexico as well.
19:51Are there plans to do that in the Senate?
19:52Tim?
19:53One at a time.
19:54So, I did an emergency challenge on the energy emergency last month, and we're all in on
20:05Canada.
20:06There are different issues.
20:07You know, Canada and Mexico are not completely the same because of some of the issues with
20:10respect to fentanyl.
20:11So, it's different.
20:13But let's get this one done, and if we can get this one done and succeed, then we also
20:17have to see what President Trump does this afternoon.
20:20There may be a whole new series of trade or tariff-related motions coming your way soon.
20:25Lord knows.
20:26Leader Schumer?
20:27Yes.
20:28Leader Schumer?
20:29Mr. Leader, as you're saying, the Trump administration says they'll get money from tariffs, they'll
20:32use it for tax cuts.
20:33This is at the same time as Leader Thune seems to be proposing, as part of reconciliation,
20:40a zero baseline for the current tax cuts.
20:44The parliamentarian will probably have to rule on that, but do you think that that comports
20:47with Senate procedure possibly?
20:49Okay, that's a different problem, but another huge problem he's causing.
20:52It wasn't the same, but you're so nice.
20:57The bottom line is this.
20:59If they go through current policy baseline, it will increase the deficit on the United
21:07States by $30 trillion, virtually doubling it.
21:11And who's going to pay the price?
21:13Us, our children, our grandchildren.
21:16It just makes no sense.
21:18It's hocus-pocus.
21:19What Mr. Chip Roy, looking for the beard, Chip Roy called it fairy dust.
21:28It's a scam.
21:29It's a scam to allow them to get more tax cuts for the wealthy, and it's going to hurt
21:34the rest of us.
21:35Thank you, everybody.